


Hannibal and the Kid

by Beap



Category: Alias Smith and Jones
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-24
Updated: 2010-04-24
Packaged: 2017-10-08 23:00:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/80382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beap/pseuds/Beap
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A gruesome attack upon Curry leave the boys reflecting, while trying to cope.<br/>(Slightly off canon with their names: Joshua "Hannibal" Heyes and Jedadiah "Kid" Curry.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hannibal and the Kid

Part One  
Fit to Be Tied

 

Joshua Smith glanced at the saloon doors each time the squeaky hinges swung. He was winning at poker, as usual, but his mind was not on the card game or on the five strangers seated at the table. His thoughts were miles away. When Joshua woke that morning, he decided to wait one more day but now, that night, he felt that he had waited too late. Too late for what, he didn't know. That unknowing left him uneasy.

"Kid, you gonna play your hand, or what," a voice asked, from his left.

Joshua glanced right to see the "Kid's" reaction like he'd done countless times before. The "Kid" wasn't there. Five pair of eyes were staring straight at him, instead. The center of attention but Joshua felt all alone. "Yeah," he answered, after seeing the ace high straight in his hand for the first time.

1:00 a. m. on a weeknight, the saloon was nearly deserted. Except for the six poker players, only two other cowhands at a distant table, a couple of more at the counter and the bartender remained. Congenially, Joshua announced to his fellow players, "Gentlemen, the hour is growing late. When we finish the next hand, I'm calling it a night." His smile was pleasant but his tone was definite. He received no protest despite winning over fifty of their hard-earned dollars.

Once outside in the crisp fall air of Lamesa, Northern New Mexico, Joshua turned this collar against the chill. With quick strides to the hotel, he hoped but he doubted that the "Kid" had arrived, bedded down for the night and had warmed the covers. The instant he entered his room, he sensed by the cold darkness of it that no one was there. Before he lit a candle, his mind was made. By first light, he would be gone.

The "Kid" should have arrived in Lamesa at least two days ago. Even if he had been apprehended by the law, he knew his legal right to send a telegraph. Something else must have gone awry. And something serious, to detain the "Kid" without reply.

Dawn found Joshua "Hannibal" Heyes in his saddle, riding to meet the rising sun.

A day and a half later, tired and dusty, he rode into Mason, New Mexico and walked into its largest saloon. The barkeep there recognized the description Joshua gave. "…twenty-five years old, baby-faced, dark blond bushy head, medium build, tan leather jacket, a Smithfield worn low on his right hip…" but the barkeep had not seen that person in a couple of days.

The telegraph clerk had not seen that person, at all.

Joshua then went to the closest hotel. Reviewing the register, he discovered that Jedadiah Jones, a.k.a. "Kid" Curry, had checked out two mornings ago. Their paths should have crossed, Joshua surmised, which left him to ponder what could have happened between Lamesa and Mason, 160 miles apart. Bridling his overly active imagination, he knew he had to backtrack and search every one-horse town and pig farm within a ten-mile radius of the dusty road.

Two days, two towns, a dozen small farms, half as many cattle spreads, fifty miles outside Mason, but nearly two hundred miles of hard travel later, Joshua had come up with nothing. Tired but anxious, he continued, hoping that the next farm would offer him a lead…or the next town…

Finally, he was in luck. He discovered that Jedadiah had stopped at a small farm to water his horse and ask for directions, three days ago. Joshua also discovered that Jed had inquired about a shortcut to Lamesa, since he was so off schedule. Told that one existed through the mountains but the aging Spanish couple had also advised against it. A nest of outlaws up there made it their habit to rob passer-bys. Despite their warning, they said that his baby-faced friend had chosen the shortcut.

Thirty miles into the rugged mountain terrain, Joshua came upon an empty campsite. Eyes dotting and ears alert, he cautiously dismounted to investigate. By the different horse tracks and boot prints spread about, he estimated that five people normally inhabited the camp. The numerous cow hooves and the large campfire itself told him rustlers. He knelt beside the ashes. To his absent friend, he uttered, "Jed, this fire is less than a day old… You should have passed by here at least three mornings ago…"

Joshua hoped for the best as he stood to remount. A flash suddenly caught his eye. Sunlight, reflecting off a distant object.

Moving a bit closer while squinting, he made out a silver belt buckle… still attached to a belt… and to a pair of pants. Once close enough, he vaguely recognized the turquoise studded metal and the faded blue denim. Several yards beyond was a familiar blue shirt, then a sock…

Frantic, his eyes darted in and out of rock formations until suddenly his breath hitched. In the distance, bawled up and huddled against a large boulder was a naked figure with familiar colored hair.

Joshua dashed.

Running too fast for his balance, he stumbled to his knees and crawled the last few yards. All the while, he prayed that his childhood friend was still alive. An all-encompassing glance gave him grievous doubts. First afraid to touch the naked, bawled and sunbaked body, he managed to squeeze his head to his bare chest. A heartbeat. Strong, regular breathing, too. Joshua exhale a bit. But still wincing, he raised his head to check his friend's injuries before attempting to revive him.

The worst seen injury got his top priority. An iron rod. Over an inch in diameter, it protruded from between two purpling buttocks. Apparent to Joshua, the rod was the handle end of a rusty old broken branding iron. Fighting the image of Jed horrendous pain as well as his internal injuries, Joshua carefully lifted his top buttock. He lost his fight. Emotions bombarded him with a flurry that instantly churned his stomach. Rage, fear, empathy, despair… all, seized him as he discovered that the iron rod had been hot when it was rammed inside Jed.

Joshua fled the horror. For a brief moment, anyway, Trembling and unsure of just what to do, he went to get his horse and his canteen. As he paced, he muttered to the sky for understanding and for the best way to handle their ungodly situation. Should he try to get Jed to a doctor or remove the rod, himself, he desperately pondered.

By the time he returned, he had made his decision. A doctor would only pull the rod out, too, he concluded. So why put his friend through the added agony of traveling over miles of mostly rugged terrain with a piece of iron burned into him, he reasoned.

Joshua sat upon the ground another moment while trying to muster his courage. He finally swallowed hard and then he took a deep breath to brace himself. With clenched jaws, he gently wrapped his trembling hand around the rod's protruding end. His slightest touch produced heartrending groans. Slow and careful, he first started to twist the rod to pry it free from the flesh that it was undoubtedly burned in to. With each slight turn, the groans grew louder until the boulders echoed with screams.

**

**

Colors from amber to deep scarlet enfolded the western mountain range heralding night. Joshua dished a tin plate of beans from his small black caldron over his campfire. He frowned at his menu and wished that he had something green or even some meat for Jed. But taking no time to hunt, he had feared more the rustlers' return. Below the mountain range, miles away, he sat upon a blanket's edge. The same blanket that covered his lifelong companion. Feeling for a fever, Joshua found a little and then he cupped Jed's jaw in his hand. He patted several times to try to rouse him. Nearly six hours since he extracted the iron, he still received only moans. "Jed, try to drink some water," he spoke loud. "Jed!"

The closed eyes slowly opened and rested a moment upon a brow bent jagged with concern. But unwilling to accept reality just yet, the eyes closed again, slipping…

"Come on, Jed!" Joshua patted harder. He then placed the canteen to his lips. Jed thirstily gulped and had to be slowed. "Easy, easy," Joshua cautioned and with tender rubs at his forehead in an attempt to comfort him. "Take it slow. You don't want to get the twinges. Easy… "

Encouraged by a familiar voice invading his wavering darkness, Jed opened his eyes, again. Hazily he gazed about the brilliant sky before settling his sight upon an equally familiar face. "Josh," he uttered.

A small smile crept. "Yeah. It's me," he said.

"When, where… where did you come from? Where are we," Jed asked as he noticed the flat and dormant grasslands now beneath him where there had once been hills and boulders.

"We'll talk about that later. First, you need to eat something," Joshua insisted and he turned to lift the tin plate. Moving, too, Jed sought a less reclined position. As he moved, a slew of malicious pains riddled through his body and he yelled out, again.

"No, no," Joshua pleaded but much too late. "Just lay still. Don't try to move."

Jed was suddenly hit by the hideous creation of his worst pains. Devastated by his memories, he fought hard at quivers seizing his lips and tears clouding his eyes. He turned his face as far from Joshua as he could, closed his watering eyes, again and prayed for the unconscious darkness of forget.

Joshua was speechless. He wanted to say something, anything, that would help alleviate his agony but he sadly accepted that words of comfort would not have the slightest impact, at that moment. Jed needed ample time to adjust to the shock of his heinous ordeal. In silence, Joshua slowly eased away and ate from his small caldron.

As he ate, he often glanced at Jed in search of a more opportune time to speak. After a while and dusk had settled into a moon-glowed night, Joshua concluded that no such moment or comforting words even existed. Calmly and quietly, he returned to his seat on the blanket's edge. Drawing in his knees to rest his chin atop them, he asked a simple and yet direct question. "What happened," he uttered.

Jed readily turned his face toward him, now, seeking his unyielding camaraderie. Suffering alone, he discovered, was as gruesome as the attack, itself. Through pools of water reflected in the starry night, he saw in Joshua's eyes his own anguish. He also saw in them an abiding closeness, in both their good times and their bad.

Little boys, Jed's subconscious remembered, eight and ten years old, scurrying through the corn fields of central Kansas in a mad race for the swimming pond. Even then, he subconsciously recalled how Joshua had looked out for him and had often let him win… or the bad times, when they lost both sets of parents in a span of four short years. Barely teenagers, they had clung emotionally and financially to each other in a desperate fight to survive. Desperate for survival, now, Jed grasped to share his tale with Joshua.

"I headed through the mountains, because;" he stopped and grimaced in an almost insufferable pain. "…because the folks on a farm told me it was a short cut to Lamesa… They told me about the rustlers, too. But I figured they wouldn't be a problem… I met up with just one, first. A really big fellow… had a dead white eye or something… and a rattleskin hat… He asked me what was I doing up there… I said, just passing through. He said that passing through would cost me every cent I had… so, we both went for our guns. I had him easy… before he could even reach his holster… but then two others came up behind my horse. With rifles at my back… The big one then said that I was too fast and he wanted to give me a long and… and slow death. That's when they beat me up. Then, they took all my clothes and…and…" Distraught to remember his epic, yet futile struggle against the three large men, he stared in fearful desperation at Joshua. His silent stare pleaded if his injuries would indeed cause his death.

Joshua didn't know. He evaded his stare and stood, peering about the semi-darkness. "What happened to them? Where'd they go," he asked.

His evasion weakened Jed more. Fighting despair, now, along with pain, he struggled to continue. "Maybe a day or so later, another fellow came up… He recognized me… Then, they started arguing over the reward money, and what to do with their herd… The big one with the dead eye finally convinced the others to take the cattle to somewhere called Millwood… and bring back a go-between, to turn me over to the law… Then, I saw the big one ride out, too… I don't remember much after that… or how long I was up there…" again, he went silent while staring at Joshua for an answer.

"Best I can tell is, um …three days," he replied but still looked about, evading, as his uneasy premonition five nights ago in Lamesa's saloon consumed his thoughts and sweated his body. Maybe he had waited too late to get Jed to a doctor, he couldn't help but think. Trying to dismiss the deadly omen, Joshua evaded once more. "Probably, a cataract eye," he surmised. "I'm sure that fellow went for that go-between, himself, to keep from splitting the reward money with the others…"

An added worry, Joshua suspected that they were now being hunted. "I want you to get all the rest you can tonight. Daybreak, we head back to Mason," he said and started kicking at the ashes to snuff their already dying campfire. "The town is large enough. They should have a doctor there." Although wary, he hoped the answer would both suffice for Jed and help throw their tail. Boonville and Cristo City were a bit closer but in other directions. Maybe the rustlers wouldn't expect them to go as far as Mason. Suddenly overwhelmed by their situation, he changed the subject yet again while now shivering from his perspiration. "It's getting downright cold," he said

Near fifty degrees, Joshua fled again to retrieve some spare clothes from his saddlebag. Helping Jed into a second shirt, he was met once more by the desperate and pained eyes. Unable to evade Jed any longer, he summarized the situation as best he could. "They burnt you pretty bad," he said. "But I think that once we get you to a doctor, and we can manage to keep the burns clean, then I think that you've got a good chance to heal." But even he was not convinced.

Jed nodded, finding a bit of comfort in the word "we." He knew that Joshua would push the limits of his resourceful brilliance to help him. But pressing him for answers while stuck in the middle of nowhere, Jed finally accepted, was pointless. All either could do, now, was what Joshua had already suggested. More rest, and simply try to hang on.

Neither slept. Beneath the single blanket, back to back, Joshua cried to hear Jed groan until both became unbearable - the pain and the tears. Navigating by stars while praising the moon for its maximum effort, Joshua guessed that they were only ten miles outside Mason as daylight came. Laid across the horse in front of him, he knew that Jed had slipped, miles ago, back into forget.

Bone weary, Joshua fought with his last waking strength to remember. Little things became major struggles, like where he was headed or even his name. The beast they were doubled-up on was more fatigued than he. Its four hooves had planted every step in the nearly five hundred miles in six days that Joshua had traveled and with only stolen moments of sleep. He doubted that either he or the horse would last for ten more, not without water for the animal and a moment of rest for himself.

Another small farm tucked away in a cluster of shagbark and pecan trees was just up ahead. It looked dilapidated and somewhat deserted as he approached but maybe it had a functioning well or at least a pond that supported the tree life, he hoped. In any case, he knew that he had to stop for a while. Both he and the horse were ready to collapse and Jed was conscious again and moaning from the horse's jolts, returning tears to his tiredness.

A water well. And often used. Thank God that it was just a few more horse steps further. Five, four, three,

A shotgun cocked. Joshua heard the sound from a cracked window. Then, came a demand. "Don't come any closer!" 

A woman's voice. Joshua all but dismissed it as he dismounted, stumbling for her well. "Just your water, ma'am," he said. "Then, we'll be on our way. I'm sorry to intrude." He was already there, drawing a bucket. "Ma'am, how far are we from Mason," he asked, but more so to ease her fears and with only his periphery on the window while he pulled.

After a short hesitation came her reply. "Nine miles, east. Over the hill."

"Is a doctor there," he asked her.

"What's wrong with him," she answered and with her face now pressed into the crack. "He looks pretty bad off."

"Rustlers, ma'am. Up in the mountains. They robbed him and left him for dead. Over three days, now. He's burnt pretty bad. I was hoping,"

The woman suddenly stormed out of her home. Obviously riled by the news, she said, "That band of thieving bastards, again! Our good-for-nothing sheriff's been promising for two solid years to go up there and clean out that nest of riff-raff. Got so, folks 'round here are scared to death of any passing stranger, anymore!" She headed straight for the horse to inspect Jed, herself.

Joshua stood, speechless. Her fieriness, language and age, all, took him aback. Easily seventy, she moved with the swiftness of a person half her years but in short jerky steps. Once a tall, flaming redheaded and even voluptuous woman, time had slumped her height, sagged her curves and had ashed her hair. Joshua stared at her in indecision that she might be insane.

"Don't just stand there, sweetie," she demanded. "Help me get him inside." She had Jed's head lifted while frowning at the senseless bruising on such a young and tender face. "Neither one of you look like you'll make Mason and this poor animal you're pushing is ready to drop dead from under you."

Possibly insane, Joshua thought and definitely bossy but he readily complied. It meant some type of attention for Jed at last, some rest for himself, and a suitable hideout for them both. Hope fueling his strength, he left the bucket in front of the thirsty mare and then slid Jed's one-hundred-seventy-five pounds off its back, again.

Straining under the weight as they entered her humble home, Joshua didn't notice the hundreds of mason jars lining her front room walls or the small forest flourishing in her kitchen. Nor did he notice the strange odors in the air or the large bootleg contraption consuming an entire kitchen corner. His eyes stared beyond it all toward a wrought iron bed, with a quilt and fluffed pillows that beckoned a head. But not his head. Not yet. The groans in his ear and the mixture of saliva, mucus and tears dripping on his shoulder reminded him that Jed still needed tending before he could rest his own weary body.

The old woman supported Jed under his other arm as she led them into her small second bedroom. Once there, she insisted, "Get him out of these clothes, sweetie, while I find something for his pain." In her quick jerks, she was gone the moment they had him reclined. Joshua didn't hesitate. He knew that modesty was a luxury that Jed couldn't afford under the circumstances.

"The burns," she called from her kitchen. "Is the flesh showing?"

"Um," Joshua stammered, unsure of just how to answer. He then remembered the iron rod. "Yes, ma'am," he replied, with conviction.

"Over three days, you say. I'm sure that fester has set in, by now. Before we can even start the healing salve, we'll have to wash the burns with some strong lye soap water and clear spirits, for a time."

Alcohol and lye soap on raw flesh. The horror in Jed's pain twisted face mirrored Joshua's thoughts as both listened to her remedies. But the prospect of infection scared Joshua more. He grew stoic to accept what needed to be done for Jed to heal. The two shirts off his battered body, Joshua reached for his half opened pants. He was met with an emphatic resistance. Jed shook his head, grabbed his belt and clutched it in an iron grip. After a brief tug-of-war, Joshua threw up his hands. Overwhelmed, scared, worried, and now exasperated, he conceded or buckle from his exhaustion.

Again, Joshua fled from Jed. For another brief moment, anyway. With a terrified friend in one room and a possible lunatic in the other, he left fear to check on madness. Suddenly, he was mesmerized as his soul leaped in a cautious joy. God was indeed great in his mercy to guide him here, he praised as he marvelled at the sight and smell of it all. This woman was no lunatic. She was a healer. A breathing soul of legendary tales and myths. Dime novels would slander her a crazy witch doctor but he knew better. Having traveled throughout the west, he had heard firsthand accounts of their miraculous healing abilities.

Standing in awe, he gazed upon the shelves of colorful mason jars that lined her front room walls. Countless jars. Medicines, foods and spirits of every shade imaginable. An herb garden grew around her kitchen window and opposite the garden stood the wire contraption where she concocted her potions.

The old woman stooped while tending a fire that started to blaze in her cast iron stove. Centuries old, the stove stood centered between her garden and her copper-wire distillery. Without looking around, she said, "Fetch me a fresh bucket of water. Then, add three cups to that pan there." With her head, she pointed toward a small window table amid her hanging forest. "Then, place the pan on the stove while I go tend his burns."

Joshua stopped her from going to Jed. "Ma'am," he whispered and he beckoned that she follow him outside.

She curiously obliged him onto the front porch. "Folks 'round here call me Ma Ames," she offered, in introduction.

"Mrs Ames," he whisper, again. "There's something that I think you should know, first."

"Then, Catherine," she said.

"Mrs. Ames, I don't know just how to tell you this… um…"

She nodded, conceding to the name as she moved a bit closer to hear him.

Joshua winced, again, to simply say it. "They burnt him. Inside."

"Inside what," she asked and with her brow sagging lower than age had accomplished to comprehend.

"Inside him."

Her brow remained low. It insisted that he explain such a peculiar notion.

Joshua's wince descended into a scowl as he stared through the front door and on into the bedroom at Jed. Overwhelmed, scared, worried, exhausted, exasperated, and now frustrated at having to tell her a third time, he yelled at her in a whispered shout. "They shoved a hot piece of branding iron up his backside!"

The old woman's face contorted beyond human resemblance. "My Lord," she said and she started shaking her head. "I thought that I had treated it all, before they reserved the Comanch. From missing scalps and eyes, mesquite burns, to cactus lashing. But never… Why in hell's honor would a body do such a thing to another," she asked to understand the satanism of it.

"Ma'am, I honestly don't know," he lied, which calmed him somewhat. He couldn't very well tell her that, between one outlaw and another, Kid Curry's infamous quick gun had brought on his wrath.

"How far into him," she asked, while still shaking her head to imagine.

Joshua swallowed hard. Wincing again to remember the horrendous sight, and odor, he uttered, "Judging by his, um, flesh on the rod, I'd say five, maybe six inches."

Ma Ames grew distant. She stood on her porch and gazed over her small farm. After a moment, she said, "put my pot on and rest a spell." She then left, slowly walking while thinking. Almost half an hour before she returned, Joshua's own infamous imagination had pondered the worst. If a healer could not help Jed, he doubted if any doctor could.

As Ma Ames reentered, she called, "Sweetie, come here!" 

Joshua jumped from his bedside chair to obey. Approaching her, he offered a proper introduction, as well. "Joshua… Smith," he said but his eyes stayed fixed on the numerous items that she struggled to carry. Under one arm, she held four long shelf boards wrapped in old horse reins. In the other, she held a hammer, a hand full of gigantic nails, four worn out horseshoes, an old applewood fipple flute and what appeared to him as some type of embalmed animal entrails. She dropped them all on her short wooden supper table centered in her long front room. "Sweetie, I need you to build me something," she said.

"Ma'am," he asked her while conceding to the name. He was too confused to care. Jed desperately needed her help but she seemed to want more shelves… and music… and only God knew about the animal guts and horseshoes. Glaring at her to explain, he reconsidered that she might be touched, after all.

"Take these four boards to the bed," she instructed him. "Nail two together on each side of the wrought iron, headboard and feet. Then, cut me four strips of these reins here, five foot each, while I go cool my steep." She was gone to her stove without further explanation to him. Only twenty-six or seven years old, she guessed, but with a keen mind. She was confident that he would figure out the rest. Now, she had no time for added words.

Joshua stood a moment while silently asking himself questions. Each answer tightened his face a bit more, until it flushed stoic, again. He finally nodded to himself, took the items and went to work.

Muffled hammering rudely riled Jed in his failed attempt at sleep. He glared toward his feet at Joshua, down on his knees at the end of the bed. "What's that for," he growled out.

"I don't rightly know," he answered Jed truthfully as he retrieved another nail from the floor. "Something that Mrs. Ames wanted me to do."

"Why," he insisted.

"She didn't say."

"She planning to tie me down or something," he deduced and with an implied warning resonating beneath the pain in his voice.

Joshua sought to sound skeptical of her intent to tie him, for Jed's sake. "Why go through all of this, when the wrought iron that she can tie you to is right here," he asked Jed, although he had wondered the same, himself. It was still a logical enough argument to quell Jed's suspicions. He settled again and tried to ignore the muffled pounding until Ma Ames entered with her cup of mixed brew. "Honey," she said to Jed. "Drink this. It'll ease the pain and help you rest."

Jed hesitated to take the cup. He looked over his head at Joshua, who was back on his knees behind the bed and was just finishing up the headboard. A quick nod was Jed's confirmation to trust her. She then nodded, too, while inspecting Joshua's carpentry. "That looks right," she said. "Now, get cutting on those pieces." She was gone, again.

"Yes, ma'am," he answered her back while squeezing his exhausted body from behind the bed and willing it to stand.

Side by side, he and the old woman worked at her center table. Ma Ames hurried, filing away at the fipple flute. "He doesn't have much time," she announced.

Her blunt statement terrified Joshua. He whirled his face to look at her. "Ma'am," he uttered, in a heartbreaking tone.

"Less than an hour before the buckthorn works him off," she answered. "We'll have to wash him out real good, right after. Then, feed him only clear steep. My spirits and lye soap can't fight the fester mixed with his dregs."

Joshua exhaled. He then glanced into the bedroom to see if Jed had overheard them.

"The valerian has got him under, by now," she said, and then she offered his heavy heart some comforting words. "He's strong enough," she assured him. "If we tend him often, he'll mend. I only wish that I had something more, some laudanum or even some locoweed to help ease the washes. But since they slaughtered the Zuni, I haven't been able to get a lot of my usual plants and that much spirits, that often, will only weaken him more. We'll just have to make do with what we got." But as she spoke, she watched his hands tremble to slice the last strip of tough leather. He didn't seem convinced. "Joshua," she said, finally using his name. However, there was something dark and almost sinister in the way that she finally said it. Her tone demanded that he listen carefully to her.

Regrettably, she reflected, "Some men that I've treated with bad burns have begged me to end their pain and suffering. And I have. A couple of times. When I saw no hope. There's hope, here. You have to always remember that," she stopped and searched his face, seeking to know if he fully understood. Upon seeing it grow pale at the difficult days ahead, she returned to the fipple flute and checked its smoothness.

"Thank you. 'Ma' Ames," he uttered. Unable to say more for fear of losing his voice, he quickly stood from the table. Leaving equally as fast, he took the strips to the bed and to check on Jed.

**

How ingenious, Joshua thought. Tied down but still the freedom to move about and even turn over, if he wished. Her creativity allowed Jed to slide both feet the entire width of the bed. She tied the leather straps around his ankles, threaded the straps between the boards and then tied the horseshoes on the other end of the straps. Jed couldn't pull the horseshoes between the wooden boards but he could slide the straps from side to side. The same with one arm. Above his head, he could slide it the width of the bed, too. For his other arm, she used the bed frame near his hip and prevented enough reach for him to untie the arm over his head.

When time came to immobilize him, she simply drew in all of his slack and hooked the horseshoes on the wrought iron.

It was all accomplished while Jed remained under her potion, including his watery stools, which Ma Ames caught in a face basin. Jed often groaned out in distress but he stayed mostly unconscious in a drug induced forget. The alcohol and lye soap water mixture, she carefully poured into her improvised douche bag made with a goat's bladder and a fipple flute. "The valerian won't hold him, here," she warned Joshua.

Without hesitation, he rushed to the other side of the bed, laid his full weight across Jed's shoulder and gingerly lifted his top buttock for her. Watching the slow and wrinkled hand carefully ease the filed down flute into the burned tissue, Joshua felt the trembles beneath his chest steadily increase. Jed still remained in his unconscious pain. The instant the mixture hit his burns, he woke. Convulsing and thrashing as if with epilepsy, he violently bucked Joshua's one-hundred-sixty-five pounds while yelling at his vocal capacity. Suddenly, he went quiet and limp, unable to withstand the pain any longer.

Again, Ma Ames captured the wash. In a tin mixing bowl. She instructed, "Rub his sunburns and bruises with the balm, then you can cover him, but leave the horseshoes be." She was gone, again, with both basins, seeking sunlight to thoroughly inspect her catch. When she reentered, Joshua rushed to meet her. He noticed the deep concern forcing her aged brow lower, once more. "Ma'am," he uttered, pleading her verdict.

She offered him no reprieve. Instead, she handed him the basins. "Wash these with the rest of the mix," she instructed and then she slowly passed her fireplace to sit in the parlor end of her long front room.

"Ma'am," he insisted, refusing to move.

She was tired, now, and she took her favorite inlaid chair in a dark and distant corner to rest a moment. "You've kept me from my breakfast," she said.

"Ma Ames," he demanded.

After a moment, she answered, "We need to wash him again in a couple of hours. You better get some rest, yourself."

Joshua was almost numb with fear and exhaustion. He did as she asked with the basins. However, he returned and went to her stove, instead. "Tell me what to cook," he insisted, the length of the room.

After another moment of thought, she allowed him. "Some flap cakes," she said. "Some of that preserve by the stove there, and my morning camellia tea will do me just fine." She even mustered a small smile to the service. Settling comfortably, she closed her eyes and crossed her feet. "Where you from, sweetie," she asked. 

"Outside Hutchinson. Kansas," he spoke as he busily searched for the items he needed.

"I've been through there, myself," she said. "Years ago. With my husband. We use to travel a lot, too, me and Matthew, when we were about your age. Been clear through to the Pacific. But this was his favorite. He said the sun and the wind here made him feel alive." She spoke more to reminiscence than to Joshua. "Mexican Territory back then. Different Ingen clans all over these parts. Mostly peaceful, sharing people. Not like most folks believe. That's how I come to healing. When Matthew passed on… some forty years, now… before I lost my two boys to the Mexican War in… '46, I had to make a living somehow. I've done alright. My home's my own. And a few acres of land. Folks 'round here come by to see me… but not as often as they once did… not since the doctor out of Sherman started making his rounds… Eighty-two, next May. I guess they think I'm too old, now… or maybe just a dying breed… anyway…"

Joshua had to wake her to eat. Alas, a bit of rest for himself. He fell upon the beckoning bed next to Jed. For Jed to wake with a second gruesome memory would be brutal enough, Joshua thought, but to find himself tied down and all alone, he hated to imagine Jed's conniption. Soothing his worried mind in efforts to sleep, Joshua stroked at his troubled brow but with his hand on Jed's forehead.

Only moments after he managed to dozed, Jed drowsily woke. Irritating puffs of warm air on the back of his neck caused Jed to elbow Joshua over a bit, like he had done since childhood. Instead, he found that his nudging arm was stretched oddly above his head, neither of his feet would move and beneath the quilt, he was… naked.

"Joshua!"

He almost leaped from the bed. "What! What!" 

"Untie me," Jed shouted, and through traitorous seeing eye. Incensed, he yanked against his bondage. "You said! … She!… She!… Untie me!"

"Settle down! Settle down!" Joshua commanded that his own racing heartbeat do the same.

"I said untie me!" Anger and struggle both labored his breathing. "You had no right, damn you! No right!…No right!"

"Easy, easy," he uttered, while trying to calm himself, too. Employing his weight, again, Joshua rested across Jed's shoulder to help hold him steady. Their faces only inches apart, he pressed their temples together. "Shhh… shhh," he soothed. "… It's ok, Jed… It's ok," he whispered as he stroked his forehead, again.

Jed finally grew still. Remnants of the potion, Joshua's gentle strokes and his calming voice coaxed him back to sleep. Exhausted, Joshua drifted with him.

From her parlor chair and an empty plate in her lap, Ma Ames listened to the shouts first erupt and then quickly end. She expected a long and drawn out protest, as was the nature of any bound animal and the reason that she left his reins tightened. But no doubt, Joshua had a special way with him. She also realized that the two young strangers were growing dear to her heart. Maybe they had awakened her motherly instincts, she wondered. Whatever the case, she felt them capture her heart completely when she went to tend Jed, again. Another cup of willow-white and valerian in hand, she stood in the doorway and watched them a moment. One sprawled upon the other's shoulder with their temples pressed together, they even snored in unison. She tried to imagine what deprivations in life had bonded them so close together. If she lost Jed, most likely to insanity, she feared that she might lose Joshua, too. It was a heavy burden for a tiring old woman.

**

Joshua followed Ma Ames and the face basin into the sunlight, the second time. He needed to see for himself what had put such trepidation on her face. Burnt skin and blood shook him. Distressed and disheartened by the sight, he wondered how Jed could possibly mend with so much damage inside him.

"We need to wash him every three or four hours for at least three more days and see where we are, then. But like I said, he's young and he's strong," she added, to give him hope before she put him back to work. "Empty the pan in the privy, then wash it with the mix." Again, she was gone.

Left with no faith of his own, Joshua latched on to hers. A moment longer he stood in thought while gazing through the shagbarks and pecans. Somewhere close were four strangers who had done this grievous thing to Jed. Four strangers, who also knew that Jed was in the area, injured, or maybe already dead. With them being cattle rustlers, it was unlikely that they would run to the law. That fact gave him a little peace of mind. However, he wondered if they also knew about the old healer. Cautious of the prospect, he corralled his horse with Ma Ames' and hid his saddle deep in the barn.

**

4:00 a.m., Joshua lie awake while watching the moonlight dance in curtain patterns across the old spruce wood floor and wondered why Jed. Between the two of them, he had the corrupt and scheming mind. At least Jed now breathed a completely pain-free snore beside him. He thanked the old miracle worker with her countless remedies for that. In bitter doses she had spoon fed them hope. His only filling meal since he first found Jed huddled deathlike against a rock, over four days ago. With that hope, plus three days of sleep, although intermittent, he was finally feeling human, again.

Lying in thought, the scents permeating the air gave him pause. Valerian, echinacea, willow-white, buckthorn, lye soap, various balms, spirits… and them. The medicines ranged from pleasing to bearable but lifting the quilt to first sniff Jed, then his blanket to sniff himself, he was finally aware that they were downright rank. With Ma Ames in her bedroom, and she had probably bolted the door against the two strangers in her home, he surmised, now was an opportune time for them both to thoroughly bathe.

He eased about in the early morning hour to build a large fire in the fireplace and he brought in the tin tub hanging just outside the front door. Finally enough well water drawn and heated in her large black cauldron, he shaved and then soaked away nearly two weeks of dirt, sweat, and horse.

Only one clean pair of long johns left, he donned them while he busily washed and hung everything else on chair backs before the hearth to dry. Mostly his clothes. Jed had lost pretty much everything… his horse, saddle, gun, coat, boots, bedroll… even his toothbrush. All would have to be replaced… but now, he wondered more on just how to get Jed bathed. He dare not untie him. There was no fooling Jed a second time. Only one option he saw left. He would simply have to shave and wash Jed up, himself.

The process first proved harder than he thought, until he finally figured out a suitable solution and Jed had stopped his annoying begs to be untied. After a fairly decent shave and brushed teeth, Joshua thought to first wash, using the face basin and then rinse with a mason jar and the mixing bowl… small sections at a time… Jed's hair, first… and then a forearm, an upper arm, a foot, and calf, a thigh… 

Jed's torso, Joshua discovered, was much more difficult to wash and rinse in small basins. And more difficult in a way that he had not anticipated.

As he sat on the bedside, rubbing the warm soapy cloth about Jed's chest, including his pectorals and nipples, he was frightened by Jed's reddening skin. Maybe he was scrubbing his already tender body too hard, Joshua feared until his periphery caught sight of the towel covering Jed's lower torso moving on its on. He then looked into Jed's equally reddened and turned aside taut face. Joshua felt the need to say something. "Oh… um…" he stammered. "I guess I should've let Ma Ames do this."

"What," Jed said and he quickly turned his taut face and stared at him.

They looked at each other a moment. Suddenly, both burst into laughter, snickering like two little boys, again, when they once peered under saloon doors at the prostitutes working inside. "Shhh… shhh," Joshua sought to quiet them but Jed could not escape the image that Joshua had just planted in his brain -- an eighty-year-old woman giving him an erection. A disturbing image, his snickering quickly turned into retaliation. "Remember the time that your mom caught you behind the barn with her goat," he asked.

"Me," he nearly shouted in his defense. "You had your pants down, too!"

Jed nearly shouted to remind him. "Only because you tried with me, first! Remember! But you wouldn't fit! Remember!"

Joshua did remember. 'Yeah," he admitted but he sought redemption in a long fifteen years ago. "How old were we, anyway," he asked. "Ten, twelve?"

Jed would not let him wiggle out so easily. "I remember that night, too," he said. "Your mom told your dad on us."

Joshua was suddenly saddened by the memories. "Yeah," he said. "But dad was ok about it." He missed the unconditional love and reassurance of his parents, especially now, when he feared that Jed would never mend. In his sad tone, he recalled, "Dad told her that we were just growing boys and trying to figure out the way of things."

Jed went somber with him. "The way of things," he repeated and with a sigh at his unruly loins. "Your dad could make everything seem right simple."

"Yeah," he said, again, while shrugging in agreement. "This, too." He looked at the towel covering Jed's loins again and he said, "Let me finish you."

Jed glared at him, dumbfounded. "You can untie me!"

Joshua shook his head. "Sorry," he said and then he shrugged again, in a two-fold apology. First, for not untying him and second, for what he was about to do. He wrung out the washcloth.

"Come on, Josh," he pleaded.

Joshua was already reaching underneath the towel. Jed suddenly turned his face back toward the wall and tried not to enjoy, too much, the warm cloth and firm hands rubbing and thoroughly cleaning him while stroking him off. It was the only pleasure that he had to look forward to during his days of suffering.

Jed's bath was finally completed. Not a second too soon for Joshua. Thankful that Jed had kept a turned head, he tried to control his own rush from the room. Standing before the fireplace in his long johns amid the drying clothes, he had to finish himself, too. A moment longer he stood stroking while gazing into the dying embers as he recomposed.

A voice spoke out. "His steep is getting cold on the table, behind you," she said. Her unaffected voice came from the kitchen area.

Joshua startled but never looked around. He thought to burrow beneath the hot ashes.

**

Flaring wild and crazed to often settle into a lifeless stare, Jed's eyes told the story of his enormous suffering. Every four or five hours, for five straight days, Ma Ames and Joshua pulled in his reins and washed out his lower colon with the alcohol and lye soap mixture. Each time either approached the small bedroom, Jed tensed and drew away as far as his reins would allow, fearful that they were coming to tighten them, again.

An empty mason jar in hand, Joshua entered and sat on the bed while purposely gazing toward the curtained window. He could no longer bear to look directly into Jed's face. He felt to blame that Jed now resembled some wild animal that he had captured and constantly tortured. In a low voice, he uttered, "Ma Ames is fixing you some more broth. Beef, this time. Please, Jed. You've got drink it all, to keep up your strength."

Jed had already scooted to the far side of the bed.

Joshua tried to ignore that he scooted in fear as he gazed down at the mason jar that he carried. "I came to see if you need to empty your bladder," he said. "Ma Ames is getting pretty angry. Changing the mattress tarp is mighty tiring and she can't keep enough sheets dry. She threatening to place a long pig entrails on your private and run the other end into a bucket, if you don't start letting us know, each time." He received no reply. Summoning enough courage, Joshua braved to look at him.

He was met with tear-weary eyes and a voice that had nothing left to give. "Josh," he mumbled. "I want this to stop. Now."

Joshua tried to remain calm. "What do you mean," he asked, although he knew the answer.

"All of this pain," he muttered in reply. "Why are we even bothering?"

"What are you saying to me," Joshua asked. "That you're ready to leave me, too."

"You'll get by. You even said so, yourself, that it's best if we split up. Sometimes."

"But who'll save me from my mouth," he asked in a miserable attempt to joke.

Jed was not buying the humor. "Come on, Josh," Jed insisted. "You've never really needed me tagging along, anyway. All of the ideas are yours. And you make all the money. I'm just somebody you've had to split it with."

Joshua readily faced him while frowning at his self-pity. "Is that what you really think," he demanded. "If not for you, I wouldn't be alive!"

Jed remained silent in his death-by-depression.

"What about Emporia," he demanded that Jed remember. "Or when the bank took our farm! I was seeing blood, that day! Especially when dad worked himself nearly to death, and us, too, just trying to hang on to it! I grabbed his old henry and headed for town! I was ready to shoot up that damned bank! You were only twelve, then! And two feet tall! But you still managed to lick me! And you saved my life in doing it!"

"Yeah," Jed uttered, wallowing more. "But he still drunk himself completely dead, right after. In our room back of the livery. You couldn't save him either, Josh, so you had to let him go. Before that, with your mom. You had to let her go. And my mom and dad. You had to let them all go. But you got over them. And you'll get over me, too."

Joshua glared at him. "Did you get over them," he demanded. All of the cherished faces came crashing back to ache the empty spaces in his heart. "Damn it, Jed! You're all I've got left! Or don't you know that!" He was infuriated by the morbid talk of death and more dying. Again, he fled from Jed. "I'll tell Ma Ames that you said ok, about the pig innards," he fussed at him while leaving.

"Josh," he called, surprised and even a bit inspired by his anger. In unspoken words, Joshua was saying just how much he truly loved him. "Josh!"

"What," he snapped as he turned.

"Yeah."

"Yeah, what," he demanded.

"Yeah," Jed repeated while beckoning his bound hands as best he could toward the jar he carried.

"Oh."

**

**

When not tending Jed, Joshua noticed that the old woman spent a lot of her time in her kitchen. She busily fiddled about her herb garden that grew in small troughs, jars and hanging pots, with vines running to nearly block out the sun. Or she sweated over her copper-wire contraption. Several people came and went in the five days that he and Jed had been there. One man dropped off a wagon load of cow chips. Another man brought large sacks of corn and sugar. A few cowhands came, too. They paid two bits for a jar of her spirits, medicines or preserves. Another woman, almost as old as she, sat a spell in her parlor.

Each time a visitor came to her small farm, Joshua eased into the bedroom with Jed and closed the door. He doubted if any of her regular folks would recognize them, nine miles outside of nowhere, unlike Kansas City or Denver and on into Cheyenne. After five days, he also doubted if the rustlers knew that Jed was there. Still, he couldn't take the chance, not with Jed trussed up and trying to mend. He did notice the suspicion on Ma Ames brow each time he came out from what obviously appeared to her as hiding. However, she never openly inquired.

**

Pus. The alcohol and lye soap mixture caught in the face basin was saturated with it. Joshua followed Ma Ames into the sunlight, again. He completely paled that the fester was now consuming Jed. After all the agony they had put Jed through, he was dying, anyway. Dying. Jed was leaving him to face a cold and unforgiving world, all alone. Joshua felt the old familiar hollow in his chest become an infinite black hole. He looked desperately for Ma Ames to stop him from falling into his own abyss.

Only, she was nodding and with a measure of relief now lifting her sagged brow. "No trace of flesh," she said. "Just a little blood. And the fester is loosening up and coming out of him real good, now. We can cut the wash back to twice a day. In maybe two more days, we can start the healing salve."

"Ma'am," he asked as he felt her filling his black hole with hope.

"You need to let him know that," she advised. "I heard him ask you, why are we bothering." She then handed him the basin for emptying and cleaning and she was gone, again.

In the blink of an eye, Joshua's face went from the deepest darkest despair to humble a noonday sun. She had literally gluttoned him on hope. After disposing of the pus, he rushed to Jed to cheer him from his constant death-by-depression. Joshua all but leaped onto his haunches near the foot of the bed, giving no notice that Jed scooted from him in flight. "You're starting to heal," he heralded through a grin the breath of his face. "Ma Ames said we can cut the wash back to just twice a day, now, and,"

"And that's supposed to make me happy, you… you… stupid bastard," he muttered, with wild and crazed eyes from another wash.

"Jed?"

"You think I don't know, don't you," he asked in his mutter. "But I do. I know." His eyes scoured Joshua with a demented contemn. "You got me all hog tied like this so you can keep hurtin' me. Cause you blame me. I know. You always blamed me…"

"Jed?"

"…You and your dad, too. And everybody. They blamed me. That's why they said what they said. I heard them. 'That boy has got an evil spirit sitting on his shoulder. Already kilt his own folks. If you take him in, he'll kill you, too. And I did… I killed them. I did…"

Joshua listened on in stark horror. Ma Ames had warned him about the pleas for death. He remembered that. But he couldn't recall, for the life of him, if she had warned of his struggle for sanity. He tried to reason with Jed. "Dad never blamed you! And neither did I," he pleaded through his shock. "You were only ten years old, for God's sake!"

"I broke her neck, I did. I did that. I broke her neck," he muttered with his wild and crazed eyes dotting about.

Joshua still pleaded with him. "You know that dad always said that was his fault! It's the reason that he started drinking! And long before we lost the farm! He said that he never should have dug that root cellar under the kitchen floor, in the first place!"

"But I left that door up, I did… I did that… I broke her neck… Then, I killed him, too. I killed them all… I killed them all…"

Joshua was terrified for Jed's mind. He eased backward off the bed and out of the bedroom. He quickly sought Ma Ames' guidance, again. She stood over her stove while staring into her simmering pot. As she turned her face, he saw a sadness in her eyes that challenged his own distress. Obvious to him, she had overheard them, again.

Ma Ames wiped her hands on her apron and then she took it off. "When his steep cools, insist that he drink it all," she instructed him. "I need to make my week's delivery to the saloon. Then, pick up a few more supplies."

"Ma'am," he asked, unable to fathom that she would leave him, now.

She pointed toward her wall near her front door. "Load those three shelves, there, into the four crates out in the barn. Then hitch up my buggy and stack them, two deep, on the floorboard."

"Ma Ames," he insisted.

"While I'm gone," she said, "give him some of the spirits. He's strong enough to handle it, this once. What other demons that he got lurking inside, let him talk them all out, before they fester, too." Again, she was gone, into her bedroom to freshen for her journey.

**

"…Cholera claimed a lot of folks that summer," Joshua continued to speak. He sat propped beside Jed on the bed while uncapping a second jar. "Mom said it was probably twenty something. Your mom just happened to be one of them. It got so bad that Doc Mitchell spread word to bring all the sick to the Protestant Church. He was worn out from making so many farm rounds. Your mom went there to check on Mrs. Hanover. It was the same day that she brought you to stay with us for a while. She said that you'd already come through the contagion. So, you see, you couldn't have given it to her…"

What Joshua didn't remember of his own mother's words, he used his active and convincing imagination to fill in the blanks. He knew that Jed was only eight years old at the time and remembered even less than he did. "Nobody knew how it spread," he said. "Or where it came from." He placed the mason jar to Jed's lips and then took another swig, himself. "What was it that my mom use to say," he asked, and then he answered his own question. "Um… she said that 'folks spread rumors like they do manure in a garden. Both of what you get end up big and juicy'… That's how your shoulder demon got started. Just something 'big and juicy' for folks to talk about. It was the same way with your dad, a few months later…"

With his soft-spoken rhetoric, he carefully watched as the wild and crazed slowly dissipated in Jed's eyes. So encouraged by what he saw, he rewarded Jed with a bit of freedom. Reaching across his stomach, he untied his arm from the mattress frame, convinced that he could overpower an inebriated one-armed man, if need be.

Jed's face lit more to completely flex an arm for the first time in almost a week. "Thanks, Josh," he said and he readily grabbed the mason jar to finally serve himself.

Joshua smiled with him as he continued. "Remember when we took Mr. Hanover's old boat out on the Arkansas," he asked.

"Remember," Jed snorted that he would never forget. "I was heaving all the while we were fightin' those currents, trying to get back to dry land."

"Then dad beat our butts raw, on top of it all. He said, if we didn't drown our foolish selves, first, we would've ended up clear to New Orleans, and then, on out into the Atlantic."

Jed recalled, "I tried to beat your butt, myself, for first talking me into that boat and then earning me his strap."

"Yeah," Joshua laughed. "And when you couldn't, you left running with both a raw backside and bloody nose. I remember, you yelled back at me that we were all mistreating you and that you were going back home to live with your dad."

The alcohol taking another drink, Jed even laughed out. "Come to think about it, Josh, you use to talk me into doing a lot of stupid things."

'I still do', he thought, but he simply laughed with Jed and then continued his point. "Folks spread the rumor that your dad was out looking for you, that night, when his horse stepped in a prairie hole and went down on top of him."

"And broke his back," Jed sadly repeated what he remembered overhearing the old folks say.

"Well," Joshua said. "Mom told me, a while later, that that rumor wasn't true. Your dad didn't even know that you were missing, that night. She said that my dad and Mr. Hanover looked for you, for a while. But you were already back with us and sound asleep when they got word about the accident."

Jed suddenly stilled to an awakened memory.

"What," Joshua asked him.

"You know," he said." Our house was dark and scary when I got there. I remember running at night, as fast as I could, back to your house. I guess that's when it was, huh?"

"I guess," he said and nodded to his revelation. "With your mom just gone and your dad still being a young man, my mom said that he was out drinking away his loneliness and gallivantin' with a widow woman who had lost her own husband to the cholera. Mom said he was going to her house, that night, when his horse went down."

"Just a lot of bad luck, huh," Jed said, wagging his head. He felt relieved of the burdensome loads.

Joshua sought to liven their little party, now that Jed seemed finally convinced that he had not killed their parents. "We've had our share of good luck, too," he said. "Remember Anna Gentry? Now, that little philomel was really singing praises to you."

Jed grinned to remember his first sexual encounter. "She got us all the way to Denver on her dad's cattle drive, didn't she," he happily recalled.

"I never did know what she saw in you, though," Joshua said, while furrowing. "You were skinny as rain, pimple-faced, bad breath, dirty enough to grow a crop on,"

"Oh, you're still jealous that I had a woman, first. Jed, Jed, what was it like? Huh, Jed? Tell me? What was it like," he taunted while ducking an elbow.

 

**

Part Two  
Wanted, Dead or Alive

Ma Ames scurried down the planked sidewalk toward the general merchandise, just past the sheriff's office. She suddenly thought to stop and inform the sheriff that the "thieving bastards" were torturing folks, too, and that she had a young man healing up at her farm to prove it. Intent upon demanding some action, now, the territorial marshal would be hearing from her if the "good-for-nothing" sheriff still did nothing.

He wasn't in. Only an aging, newspaper-reading deputy sat at his desk. She chose to wait, if not too long, and take up her business with the sheriff. Clutching her two dollars per crate in her money pouch, she sat and gazed about the office. A bulletin board provided her with some interest and she read the large amounts offered for outlaws.

Several $50 rewards were posted… a couple of $200... and even a $2500 reward. She tried to determine if the mountain gang was there and she started over to read the finer print. It was then that she noticed the two whoppers down in a corner of the board. $10,000, each, offered for the capture of "Hannibal" Heyes and "Kid" Curry. She wondered who would pay such an outrageous amount, and why. Close enough, she read the entire posters.

WANTED  
DEAD OR ALIVE  
"HANNIBAL" HEYES  
$10,000

Offered by  
THE UNION PACIFIC RAILROAD in conjunction with the FEDERAL RESERVE BANK of DENVER COLORADO  
"Hannibal" Heyes, 25 years old, 5 feet 11 inches tall, 160 pounds, Dark Brown Hair, Dark Brown Eyes.  
Wanted for Robbery  
Theft of Property over $500 Oct 1872 Theft of Property over $2,000 Jan 1873  
Theft of Property over $1,000 Apr 1873 Theft of Property over $8,000 Jun 1873  
Theft of Property over $5,000 Jul 1873 Theft of Property over $12,000 Nov 1873  
Theft of Property over $15,000 Feb 1874 Theft of Property over $16,000 Sep 1874  
Theft of Property over $10,000 Oct 1874 Theft of Property over $40,000 Aug 1875  
Theft of Property over $150,000 Jan 1876 Theft of Property over $30,000 Jul 1876

 

WANTED  
DEAD OR ALIVE  
"KID" CURRY  
$10,000

Offered by  
THE UNION PACIFIC RAILROAD in conjunction with the FEDERAL RESERVE BANK of DENVER COLORADO  
"Kid" Curry, 23 years old, 5 feet 11 inches tall, 170 pounds, Dark Blond Hair, Blue Eyes.  
Wanted for Robbery  
Theft of Property over $500 Oct 1872 Theft of Property over $2,000 Jan 1873  
Theft of Property over $1,000 Apr 1873 Theft of Property over $8,000 Jun 1873  
Theft of Property over $5,000 Jul 1873 Theft of Property over $12,000 Nov 1873  
Theft of Property over $10,000 Feb 1874 Theft of Property over $16,000 Sept 1874  
Theft of Property over $10,000 Oct 1874 Theft of Property over $40,000 Aug 1875  
Theft of Property over $150,000 Jan 1876 Theft of Property over $30,000 July 1876

 

The deputy noticed that she had turned as white as a sheet flapping in the wind. "Ma Ames, are you alright," he asked.

She slowly nodded while allowing herself time to conjure up a suitable response. "My lord," she said. "I didn't know that there were so many wanted men about. Enough to frighten an old woman all alone on her farm half to death."

"Yes, Ma'am," the deputy said while stifling a smile. He thought that there was nothing frightened about Ma Ames.

Pretending to be, she asked, "How many of these men, here, are wanted for murder?"

The deputy left his desk and went over. "Just this one, here, for $2500," he said. "See, it's in the print."

"And these two $10,000 ones," she asked, discreetly picking his knowledge.

The deputy laughed outright, this time. "For "Kid" Curry and "Hannibal" Heyes," he said. "You mean, you haven't heard about these two? These boys are regular folk heroes, up north of here."

"For $20,000," she said, "I'm sure that the law and every bounty man, too, is hard on their trail." For added disguise, she shook her head to imagine the number.

"The law about gave up," the deputy reluctantly admitted. "These posters are near three years old. Rumor has it, they're down in Mexico somewhere, living off what money they didn't give away."

"Give away," she asked. "I estimate near a quarter million dollars, here, they stole."

"Yeah," he said, happy again to share the tale. "To some farmers up in Kansas and Nebraska, to keep the banks from foreclosing on them. You know, the Federal Reserve had to give all that money back to those banks they robbed. Even took some of those farmers to court. The railroad, too. It was a big to-do, last year. But the court ruled that the reserve and the railroad didn't have a legal leg to stand on about where those farmers got that money. Yeah, those two boys are folk heroes, alright. Made fools out of the reserve and the railroad, twice. You see, they offered that much money, sure that bounty hunters from coast to coast would be after them. But it turns out, most bounty men won't even touch them, cause they gave away to poor folks pretty near all they stole. Some bounty men even say, let them keep stealing, to get back at the banks for cheating so many poor folks. Yeah, them boys are folk heroes, alright. Retired a couple of years ago and are long gone."

With the possibility of that much money under her roof, Ma Ames feared the 'thieving bastards' even more. She asked, "Well, is there any word on that riff-raff up in the mountains?"

"Yes, ma'am, there is," the deputy announced with pride. "We caught three of them driving some altered brands over to Millwood, just last week. The sheriff already took them to Amarillo, on some outstanding warrants down there. The other one is probably clear out of the territory, by now."

"Good," she said. "Well, you just tell the sheriff that folks 'round here can rest a bit easier, now." She was gone, again.

In her short jerky steps, she scurried. Ma Ames was pretty sure that she had two famous outlaws in her home, not to mention $20,000. Neither poster had said Joshua and Jed by name but the descriptions could not have fit them better. She also knew that Joshua always eased from sight whenever anyone came around. A few supplies slipped her mind. She left that instant to find out just what kind of danger lurked about her farm.

Ma Ames planned to be gone much longer than three hours while Joshua got Jed drunk. Knowing the nature of men and spirits, she suspected that Joshua would be drunk, too. While they partook, she planned to fetch her supplies, reciprocated a parlor visit and then return when both were sleeping it off. But after only three hours, she didn't know what to expect.

"Ma!"

A boisterous toast greeted her entry. Joshua bellowed from his prop against the wrought iron. His broad smile beamed his indebtedness to her. No longer was Jed talking wild and crazed.

Jed instead happily slurred, "Josh, Ma's back."

From the front door, she could tell that Joshua was near intoxication. He sat comfortably against a pillow, boots extended upon the bed, and he hailed one of her fancy crystalline jars. Jed, on the other hand, was well beyond. No food in a week, it didn't take much. An arm untied, he had it flung across Joshua's calves with his head sprawled upon his lap. He gazed woozily between the two boots to see her, waist high.

Ma Ames stopped in the bedroom doorway. She sternly folded her arms as she leaned against the doorframe. "I see that you boys found my best spirits," she mentioned, casually. "I brought those jars all the way from Ohio, clear through 'Hannibal', Missouri."

The broad, ingratiating smile remained but the startled eyes belied its sincerity. However, seldom one to panic at the prospect of being captured, Joshua simply corrected her. "Carthage," he said.

"Beg pardon?"

"A general amongst kings, leading 40 elephants and 40,000 foot soldiers over the Spanish Alps to do battle with the mighty Roman Empire." He proudly toasted, again, honored by the comparison.

Ma Ames had lost him completely when Jed chimed in, in a stupor. "Did she say 'Hannibal,' he slurred, again. "How'd she know that?"

Joshua conceded to the names. "It just keeps coming up, don't it, 'Kid," he said. The cheer was gone.

"Oh," he uttered. Overwhelmed by their predicament, he readily succumbed.

Joshua settled back in defeat, captured, and by an eighty-year-old woman. "Is the sheriff outside," he asked.

Ma Ames bolt upright. "Who else can I expect at my door," she demanded. "Who's trailing you? Does this have anything to do with his burns?"

Joshua sought wit to help calm her. "The first, my lady," he said, "is at your gracious mercy. The second, possibly the rustlers. And lastly. Yes."

She appreciated his succinct honesty and she calmed somewhat since she appeared in no imminent danger. "The deputy said that they caught three of them, already, and the fourth, he thinks, is running."

"Well, that's a bit of good news. Now, about the sheriff?"

"What about him," she asked. She had not decided that one, herself.

"$20,000 is a lot of money, ma'am."

"Yes. It is," she said and she was gone, again. To rest her aged bones in her favorite parlor chair.

Joshua sat in thought with Jed's head in his lap. Three options occurred to him. He and Jed could both flee. But not very far. Jed couldn't sit a saddle and he still needed tending, soon and often. He could flee while leaving Jed in the care of the law's hopefully capable hands and try to bust him out, later. Or both could stay and hope that Ma Ames had a compassion greater than $20,000. Since the sheriff didn't have them in chains already, he chose her compassion, closed his eyes and tried to sleep it off.

The fipple flute poked him awake, only two hours later. Ma Ames stood over the bed, undeniably peeved by their reckless and even ruthless behavior. Especially, since she had grown so fond of them. A week was more than ample time to warn her that someone, and the 'thieving bastards', at that, may have hunted them straight to her door. They had chosen not to reveal that important fact, nor their true identities. She'd been denied the opportunity to decide for herself if she wanted to take the same risk that they had so obviously grown accustomed to. In her anger, she demanded, "Tie that arm back! Then tighten those reins!"

"Yes, ma'am," he said and jumped to her command, despite a throbbing head. Jed only grunted when his pillow abruptly left.

Ma Ames fussed as she poured the alcohol and lye soap mixture into the goat's bladder. "I ought to throw you two out of here, right now," she said. "If not for these burns, you both would have been gone the second I got back from town!"

"Yes, ma'am," he appeased.

"…Riff-raff in my own home…

"Yes, ma'am."

"…breaking bread at my own table…"

"Yes, ma'am."

"…leaving me just as guilty, for housing outlaws…"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Quit saying yes ma'am, and hold him steady!"

"Yes… um, ma'am."

"I got a good mind to go get that sheriff, anyway…"

"Oh. No, ma'am."

She glared across the bed at him. "How much of that money that you stole did you stash in your own pockets," she asked.

Joshua thought back. "Um… All total, maybe, um, three, four hundred."

She glared harder to believe him. "You must think that I'm old and dementiaed," she fussed. "Even I know that you can't run from the law and hold down a steady job, too. You two started thieving near eight years ago. What have you been living off, in all that time," she insisted to know.

"Poker."

"Poker!"

"Yes… um, ma'am."

"First thieving and now gambling," she said, shaking her head, absolutely perturbed by them. In her agitation, she demanded, "I said, hold him steady!"

Jed suddenly woke to a seemingly endless nightmare.

**

 

Part Three  
Devil's Hole

Nine miles was too close. Mason's sheriff had captured the rustlers who knew that Kid Curry was in the area. And where there was Kid Curry, there was bound to be Hannibal Heyes. Not enough degrees of separation to suit Joshua. He took his business over to Sherman, half a day's buggy ride away. The special occasion left him cheerful and well worth the added miles. Jed, he noticed, was downright ecstatic. No more excruciating washes, Ma Ames had started the healing salve. It meant Jed's freedom, as well. Along with his freedom, he needed more clothes, a coat and boots to stir about and regain his strength. The horse, saddle and such were premature but Joshua knew that they would lift his spirits even more. He took Ma Ames buggy to fetch it all. Carpentry supplies, to spruce up her old farm while Jed finished mending was the guise he used to pull off his surprise.

Like a toddler in a toy store, Jed wobbled about the bedroom opening his brown paper wrappings. He beamed that Joshua had remembered to get him everything from a new Smithfield to a toothbrush. "Thanks, Josh," he said a dozen times in gratitude while he donned his new attire. Then, he eagerly strapped on the gun to check its balance.

Ma Ames stood propped against the bedroom door frame and shared in his joy. Curiously, she watched his gun play. "You're mighty fast with that thing," she said. "Where'd you learn that," she wanted to know.

"Devil's Hole," he replied, preoccupied.

Ma Ames bolt upright, again. The notorious Devil's Hole Gang, she did know. "You two were part of that murdering band of thieves," she demanded.

Joshua was quick to ease her mind, well aware that she could still summon the sheriff. "We never went out on any jobs with them," he tried to explain. "That's the reason no murder charges are out, against us."

"Then, what were you two doing in Devil's Hole," she still insisted.

Tactfully evasive, he answered, "Just learning our trade, you might say."

Jed half followed the conversation while still practicing his fast draw. Upon hearing Joshua's lackluster words, he spoke up with pride twinkling in his eyes. "Josh, you made top planner while we were there," he corrected him.

"Planner," the old woman asked, with a frown.

Joshua quickly said, "just kind of a scout,"

Jed interrupted, again. "A planner is far more that," he said in his praise to Joshua's resourceful brilliance. "The jobs were all his ideas. He never got anybody killed or even caught, while he was in charge."

Ma Ames nearly shouted, "In charge! Of the Devil's Hole gang!"

Joshua hid a cringe to Jed's persistent and damaging praises. He still tried to downplay their involvement and he said, "All total, we were there for less than a year." However, his face suddenly grew distant to remember the gang's turbulent demise. A cold stillness engulfed Devil's Hole as that final fateful day came crashing back to him:

**

Some forty strong, the remaining twenty-five men moved about the small mountain settlement in quiet anticipation of the Boulder train crew due back by nightfall. Big Jim Santana was the gang's leader. His main cabin, the bunkhouses, stable, kitchen, supply shed, all, echoed in an eerie silence.

Just the day before, Big Jim had announced that Boulder's train was the last job of the season. Snows would barricaded the Hole until spring. Most of the men had decided to chance leaving in the night, although well aware that posses would be combing the southern Wyoming territory for them. Another week or two in the Hole to wait for the posses to disburse increased their risk of being snowed in, all winter.

Joshua stood uphill in the main cabin's doorway and looked out over the settlement. The cold eeriness tugged at his senses, leaving him uneasy. His eyes searched hastily the grounds below, looking for Jed. They found him. He added more wood to the bunkhouse porch pile. A long list of menial tasks, Jed was the Hole's dishwasher, stable boy, water boy, when he was not practicing his fast draw. Fast talk on Joshua's part had gotten Jed into Devil's Hole, too, after Big Jim issued him a personal invitation.

Poker introduced Joshua to Big Jim in a Denver saloon. Almost forty dollars Joshua won and most of it belonged to Big Jim. The large, strongly built, former theology teacher and preacher had become disillusioned with life. Somewhat disillusioned by life, himself, Joshua instantly liked the older, father figure of a man. After the card game, they spent hours talking of religion, politics, morality, finances and women.

The next day, P.T. Barnum's "Greatest Show on Earth" with its three-ring circus was in Denver. The law recognized Big Jim and had him cornered in a café, having lunch. Joshua and Jed just happened along at the right moment. Quick to think, Joshua sent Jed for the horses while he managed to release three circus elephants to occupy the law. Amidst the chaos created by the large lumbering mammals, Joshua helped Big Jim escape. Talking fast, he got Jed an invitation, too, as the three galloped out of Colorado headed for Laramie, Wyoming and then just northwest, to Devil's Hole.

Big Jim told a colorfully tale to his men of how, like "Hannibal", the famous war general… and this "kid" here… had used elephants to save his hide from the law. The nicknames stuck, as well as a measure of respect for them. Before summer's end, Joshua had learned enough from Big Jim to scout and plan jobs. So good at it, he took over as lead planner the following year.

That final foreboding day, Jed, too, sensed an unexplainable, almost gothic presence and he searched equally as vexed for Joshua. Comforted somewhat by each other's whereabouts, they resumed with their separate tasks. Joshua sought the gang's now demoted second planner, wondering of his winter intentions.

Long and lanky, Hank Walton conversed with Big Jim over coffee at a bunkhouse mess table. As Joshua entered and joined them, Hank was saying, "with fifty dollars from this job, I'll have enough for a good down payment on the farm. I can't expect Beth to wait much longer. She'll be twenty-five this winter. Her friend are all married with two, three little ones, by now. Iowa will be a lot different from Wyoming, but," He stopped to Hannibal's unusual gaze at him. "What," he asked.

Joshua tried to shake his eerie premonition. Something almost sinister told him that he would not be seeing Hank Walton, again. Eleven months, stretching over two years, they had shared the main cabin with Big Jim, first scouting and then planning a score of jobs together. The eeriness grew stronger and he grabbed the back of Hank's hand resting on the table and tried to shake his uneasiness with a smile. "I'm happy for you," he said. "I'm glad to hear that you're ready to buy that farm."

Hank smile, too, as he replied, "I'm leaving tonight, headed through the badlands."

Big Jim nodded at his plan. "That'll be rough travel," he said. "But I doubt if any posse would expect it, let alone follow you there. Myself, I'm chancing the snows. When I leave Devil's Hole, I'm headed straight for Santa Fe, and not via the Dakotas. What about you and the Kid," he asked Hannibal.

"Somewhere warm," Joshua said as continued to force a smile. "I wouldn't mind seeing New Orleans, or even San Antone. With the Kid's face, I figure that we can leave most any time. He still looks fifteen. Not even shaving, yet. I doubt if any posse would suspect me, as long as I'm with him."

Hank finished his coffee and stood. They all did. "I've got some packing and some good-byeing to say," he said.

Three hours later, but two hours ahead of schedule, the Boulder train crew rode in fast, hard and dusty. Their horses were virtually collapsing beneath them. The whole crew was excited, even frantic, as they rushed about, looking for Big Jim. Jed and Joshua watched from a distant fallen tree, with axes in hand. Seeing the tumultuous scurry first toward the privy where Big Jim was and then toward a bunkhouse, they dropped their axes and scurried, too. Big Jim and the crew leader were both yelling and pacing, stopping and starting, arms waving, as if in a frenzy. By the time Joshua and Jed reached the bunkhouse, every man in camp was crowded inside. Big Jim had stopped yelling.

Filling Big Jim's silence, the overlapping conversations created a deafening roar like an avalanche of rustic leaves. Joshua was unwilling to break through the ruckus. He stood near the door while picking up bits and pieces of information. What he was hearing was starting to terrify him. He discovered that his job had netted much more than the $2,500, which he anticipated. Jed stood beside him and tried to stand closer as the ear-taxing roar soared.

Big Jim finally waved his arms above the crown and the room fell deathly silent. All eyes instantly directed themselves toward five saddlebags upon the mess table. Big Jim tried to sound casual but he failed in his efforts as he announced, "It seems that we've gotten a bit more than we expected." He then dumped the haul from the saddlebags out on the table. Each stack had $10,000 printed on the wrapper. The astounded and covetous eyes followed his every motion as he meticulously counted 85 stacks. "$850,000," Big Jim summed and then he grew speechless as he sat and stared at it all. For several moments, the crowd remained speechless, too.

Hank pushed his way over to Hannibal. "I can't believe this luck," he said, prancing ecstatic as the avalanche suddenly resumed. "I can buy the whole farm at once and still," he stopped, after seeing the sheer terror on Hannibal's face. "What," he insisted.

"$850,000, Hank! That's what," he shouted. "There's no way in hell that we can keep that much money! They'll send everything,"

Big Jim found his voice. He stood and boomed over the noise. "$20,000 per man," he announced. "As far as I'm concerned, the Devil's Hole Gang is disbanded!" He continued to shout against the now pandemonium. "I'm headed north through the Wyoming Pass, as soon as I can pack!"

Joshua cried out, "Wait! Wait!" His frightened mind raced to understand their jubilation. "Stop! Hold on!" He yelled, pleading. So alarmed, he subconsciously blocked the door with his back and his fingers twitched near his holster. Jed shook to see them twitch but he stood steadfast beside him. "Big Jim! Stop!" Joshua continued to plead. "Think about what this means!" With the gang leader's attention, he prayed to have the others. The fear commanding Hannibal's normally unshakeable voice prompted Big Jim to raise his arms, again.

With the crowd's precarious attention, Joshua quickly grabbed a chair to stand in. He then started with the fastest talk of his young life. "Payrolls! And, and supplies! For the whole Northwest Cavalry! That's what we have here! If we keep this money, the U.S. government will send everything, including the cavalry, after us! We have to give it back!"

He thought even harder to devise a plan. "We send out two men! One with the money just north to, to Medicine Bow! Leave the money in safe deposit boxes, there! The other man, he'll send a telegraph from Laramie to Fort Collins telling them where to find the money! The rest of us, we hold up here until we get an all clear! A week, maybe two, just like some of us already planned! I'll even try to negotiate with the fort, if,"

"Hannibal!" Big Jim finally stopped him. "I understand your concern but there's no proof that this is cavalry or even government money. It would take us a lifetime to earn this much! Most of these men have wives and children to feed!" He justified even harder than Joshua, to hang on to it. "If we head out of here right now, we can be in all parts before anyone can even form a posse!" He looked to his men. "Who's with me," he demanded to know. The money made it unanimous. Hank was already pushing his way back to the table, insisting that Big Jim divide it, now, so that everyone could saddle up and keep riding.

"Hank, nooo…!" Joshua begged.

Hank shouted angrily at him. "This is my whole life, here, Hannibal! I can't give that back!"

The crowd shoving around the table, ignoring Joshua, hammered in his defeat. He sat in the chair, dazed by the days to come.

Jed's devastated face staring down at him brought him back to reality. "Josh, what are going to do," he insisted.

Joshua suddenly grew paler. He had been so concerned with the gang's fate that he hadn't realized that they were in equal peril. Rubbing his forehead while trying to think, he sat forward in the chair.

Devils' Hole was impregnable, or so he'd heard. An old volcano top, it was surrounded by wind-chiseled cliffs except for a twenty-yard opening, evidently cut by molten lava centuries ago. Looking east out of the opening, a series of treeless plateaus stepped downward into the countryside, miles below. Strong winds racing around the chiseled mountains and into the entrance could lift a grown man, at times. Those same winds in winter blew in snow, forming a barricade almost as high as the volcanic rim, itself. Enclosed were ten or so acres of bowl shaped and treed valley that was the Hole. Two men sitting on the rim with enough ammunition, it was said, could hold off an entire army.

Joshua uttered, "Maybe it is a fortress." It seemed a much wiser alternative to what the others had decided. "I'm staying," he said. "Maybe, all winter." He sat back, hoping that he had chosen the lesser of two evils.

"All winter," Jed demanded. He couldn't conceive it.

Fear and guilt infuriated Joshua. He shouted, "Hell! You can go, too! Nobody's keeping you here! But remember this! With Fort Laramie, east! Fort Fetterman, just north! Fort Collins and Cheyenne, both south! Fort Steele, due west! Half a dozen, just beyond those! Plus federal and territorial marshals! Sheriffs! Posses! Not to mention, bounty hunters! Customary reward for returning stolen money is ten percent! Half the territory will be trying to cash in on some of that $850,000! Everybody within two hundred miles of here will be stopped and searched, baby-faced and all! If you can't prove where you've been in the last two days, let alone six months, then you're a suspect, whether you got any money on you or not! And what will you tell them? That you 'were' in Devil's Hole, but you weren't a member of the gang! Do you think that'll matter with that much money at stake?" He stopped shouting and looked toward the table and at the men hurrying past him, one by one, clutching tightly to their bundles. He couldn't help but think, their deaths. Leaving, too, he stood. "I'm going to see who else has the good sense to stay."

Jed readily followed him, now convinced by the grim portrait that he had just painted. Within fifteen minutes, only the old cook and two others beside joshua and Jed were not around the stables searching out fresh horses, packing, or already on their way. Big Jim rode up. "Hannibal, Kid. Good luck," he said and tossed them two bundles each and then he was gone.

No sooner had the last man rode out, a dark and ominous mass begin to creep over the western rim. Coming with it, an instant chill enveloped the now quiet and nearly deserted camp. Joshua anxiously looked about the skies, praying for the early snows. "Dad use to say that God protects children and 'fools'," he uttered. Only four of them for lookout, since he doubted the old cook would help, it meant twelve-hour shifts. "We better get everything that we can up to the cabin and then take the first watch."

Nearing dusk, he and Jed finished making several trips up the sloped side of the mountain. They gathered extra munitions, an old tarp to keep warm and dry, extra blankets, salted meat, bread, water… Sheltered inside a small groove and beneath a small embankment from the general winds and now blowing snows, they sat and stared below into semi-darkness while awaiting the arrival of someone they hoped would never come.

The hours passed like days. Jed started to nod but a wandering mind kept Joshua fully awake. He argued with his conscience, both defending and prosecuting himself. How could he have known that $850,000 was on that particular train, he defended. What's more, he had desperately tried to give it back. He couldn't be held responsible for any disastrous fate that might befall some thirty-five men now roaming the countryside. That madness had been their decision.

Prosecuting himself, his foolish and immature planning had put temptation in their way, had probably brought the entire U.S. Government down on their backs and had reduced him to sitting upon a mountainside in the cold, dead of night, seeing almost nothing and straining his ears against the howling winds. He wanted to cry.

Instead, he looked at Jed and his wandering mind resumed. They had been closer than most brothers for longer than either could remember. If Jed wanted to sever that lifelong ties, he couldn't blame him, that is, if they survived his monumental blunder. Frightened by both prospects and with little else to offer for the hell that he had wrought Jed, he wrapped his blanketed arm like a large wing about his shoulder to pull him closer.

Jed startled. He was then crudely aware, once more, of their cold and vicious surroundings. If not for the tarp retaining their body heat, they would probably freeze to death. He huddled tighter, curled up against the bitter cold and laid his shoulder across Joshua's lap.

So forgiving, Joshua thought, when he could not forgive himself. He slumped over Jed's shoulder and did cry, as the snows turned to blizzard, and the wind, a thousand wolves.

**

The early dawn brought sunlight and the telltale signs of their harrowing night. Blinding Joshua, a sheet of white covered everything and he strained his eyes to see the pass. Excitement rushed his senses and he had to get closer and be absolutely sure. He woke Jed, who startled again, slightly embarrassed by his bed upon the snowy mountain ridge. Quite obvious to him, he had done no looking out, that night.

"Come on," Joshua said, "Let's check the pass."

Normally a twenty minute descend took them over an hour. Arduous and carefully planted footsteps to get to the bottom, they then gazed upon a solid wall of white at least fifteen feet high that separated them from the outside world. "Nobody will be coming, 'til spring," Joshua said, fairly confident and fairly relieved.

"Or going," Jed replied, fairly dry.

"Well, this is home for a while," Joshua said, fully understanding his dryness. Both knew that Devil's Hole would be no winterhaven. "We better find some heat and let the others know."

**

They called the old cook Patch, because he claimed he had a bad left eye. But the large patch that he wore didn't cover everything. Jed often nudged Joshua for staring too long. It seemed, half the man's left face was missing. Patch said that he fought a grizzly once, up in the Montana high country. "Killed that baar for taking my eye," he boasted.

Anyway, Patch was dead.

Froze to death right in his own bed… or a heart attack… or something. Whatever the cause, fear ruled the others. Only January, the four remaining men begin to doubt if they would last 'til spring. After they managed to bury Patch in the frozen earth beneath the mounting snow, Joshua and Jed took to sharing a small bunk, which earn them an unfavorable reputation since two other bunks were available.

His fast draw nearly perfected, Jed wanted to challenge the two older men for their often tasteless remarks but Joshua always stepped in, quick witted and smiling, to quell the tensions.

Early February, the last horse died, despite their best efforts. Soon after, another man developed the pleurisy and he was gone. The third man out now wished that he had a bunkmate and in late February on a clear, windy and blistery thirty degree below zero night, he froze to death, too.

Only by the grace of God, their youth, a piece of wagon tarp and a little common sense to stay warm, Joshua Heyes and Jedidiah Curry walked away from Devil's Hole in late March. Splitting a cautious thousand of their now hefty $100,000, they buried the rest deep in the sloped mountainside. Scaling the remaining snow barrier and then twenty-five miles of hard walking, Laramie was a large enough town to get lost in for a few days.

Old newspapers gave Joshua the information he sought. Researching back issues at the Laramie Chronicle, what he discovered confirmed his fears and left him severely depressed. Big Jim Santana was in Leavenworth and was scheduled to be hanged in thirty days. The article was written back in November.

Hank Walton was shot dead, running from the cavalry. Of the $850,000, all but $140,000 had been recovered, meaning that only two others, beside he and Jed, had escaped his Boulder train disaster. Thirty-six men had either been killed, had frozen to death or were incarcerated because of him. He blamed himself. So disillusioned, he convinced Jed that they leave Wyoming the next morning for Hutchinson, Kansas, and back to their old familiar stumping grounds.

**  
Ma Ames saw a sorrow in Joshua's eyes that seemed to age him ten years. Whatever happened in Devil's Hole was punishment enough, she decided, and she never mentioned it, again.

**

 

Part Four  
Looks Can Deceive

The roof no longer leaked. Several boarded over windowpanes saw new glass. A half leaning picket fence stood tall, again. Mucked out and put in order, the barn and its tools glistened. The pecan orchard was pruned back. Winter's firewood was chopped. Horses had a season of hay. Well bricks were resodded…. yard debris cleared away… and a coat of white paint brightened everything. Ma Ames marveled at the volume of work one man could do in eight weeks time. And all, at his own expense.

She knew it was done, only in part, to regain her good grace. To that part, she was grateful. "Hard for a body to stay mad at someone who works so hard," she said. She stood near the well where she first saw Hannibal Heyes as she gazed over her small farm. A rare toothless grin lifted her face. "Looks near brand new, again," she beamed.

Joshua finished painting the well's bricks. Near freezing temperatures and lost to a distant thought, his response was dispassionate. "Thank you, Ma Ames."

The other part of his tireless labor, she knew, was done out of sheer nervousness. Jed's burns had virtually healed but his future still remained uncertain. The prospect left all three apprehensive. Like some incestuous occurrence, suspected and yet avoided, she knew that neither he nor Jed had uttered an open word about it.

Ma Ames continued to hold a tight rein on Jed. With winter settled in and he'd lost almost thirty pounds to his liquid diet, she insisted that he remain inside to avoid the pleurisy or the croupous. She still kept him busy. Like Joshua, she bossed him, too. Three separate fires he maintained -- the hearth, the stove and the cow chip. He dished corn and sugar into her copper wire contraption, shelled pecans for her to sell in town, stacked shelves, washed mason jars, dishes…

One day, after considerable thought, Jed turned to her from his dish basin. "Ma Ames," he said. "You've been pretty upset with Josh and me a while now for stealing and gambling but you're a bootlegger." He lacked Joshua's subtle diplomacy.

Slow to respond, Ma Ames recalled the decades of countless justifications that she had conjured up for herself and all of them were true. Spirits weren't harmful, if taken in moderation. Making good spirits was a well respected craft. If she didn't sale to the saloon, then someone else would and probably gut rot, at that. Hers was pure quality and everybody knew it. In her best self-defense, it was how she made her living, now that a regular doctor was about. But truth be told and this young man just had, she was a bootlegger. And a hypocrite to boot. To his blunt statement, she said, "It's time you rested a spell."

Jed gladly removed his hands from the soapy water.

 

**

Their worried wait had finally arrived. Solid foods. Ma Ames was confident that Jed had mended but the question remained, how had he mended. Jed and Joshua sat nervously at the supper table while waiting for Ma Ames to decide his first meal. All three silently reflected on the enormous suffering that Jed had endured to reach that moment. From her shelf of preserves, she selected applesauce to mix with some lightly scrambled eggs.

Joshua watched his anxious eyes as they followed the jar to the stove. "Don't worry, Jed," he said. "You'll be back to steak and potatoes before you know it."

Half listening to his optimism, his eyes remained fixed on the jar. "I can hardly wait," he uttered.

"Neither can I," Joshua said. "You look a fright."

His eyes redirected while narrowing to stare at him. "Thanks a lot, Josh."

He continued to joke. "I haven't seen you this scrawny since we hired out to Mr. Owens, during his corn harvest." Jokes, he discovered long ago, helped to occupy their worried minds. He knew that it worked, again, because Jed now laughed in agreement.

As Jed laughed, he recalled, "we never did convince him that I was fifteen, did we."

Joshua tried harder to continue his laughter. "With your face and all of five feet tall, you looked about ten, tagging behind me and running just to keep up."

Jed readily said, "I grew nearly a foot while we were there."

"That still didn't convince him," Joshua joked. "I think he gave you twelve, after that."

"He knew that I worked harder than any twelve year-old could."

"We both did," Joshua said. "And then, he couldn't pay us. He said that he owed every penny he had, and them some, to the bank." Joshua remembered the numerous small farms from Newton to Junction City where they found shelter and work, after his father died. Many of those same farms, he and Jed kept the banks from foreclosing on, which earned them the status of folk heroes.

Jed continued to laugh. "I thought he'd come after for us, for sure, after we took his old nag and headed for Kansas City."

"He probably did," Joshua said, laughing, too. "Only, he didn't expect us to detour through Hutchinson, first. I'm more surprised that the sheriff didn't get us, doubled up on that old sorrel."

"Maybe the sheriff thought a box of shells and a side of salted pork wasn't worth the chase. You know, we could've taken a lot more from that general merchandise. I know I wanted to. Like some canteens and some cooking gear. Some mighty nice wool coats were in there, too."

"Yeah," Joshua agreed, in hindsight. "Especially when I got the pleurisy outside Emporia. Just to get us a room for a while, you sold old henry." His regret sounded more for a departed family member than a rifle.

"I had to, Josh. You were coughing up blood."

"I know, I know… I'm not blaming you. It's just that it was all that I had left of dad's."

"Old henry fetched us twenty dollars, along with that nag," he boasted of his bargaining skills Only fifteen, his quick thinking help Joshua recuperate. "That room and food let you heal up," he said. "But if we were really smart, we would have stayed with Mr. Owens all winter. He couldn't pay us but, at least, we would have been warm and fed instead of stealing just to eat and sneaking into folks barns to keep from sleeping out in the snow."

"Yeah," Joshua laughed to remember. "I thought we'd freeze, for sure, that winter."

"Or starve to death."

"And speaking of starving," Joshua said, smiling as he greeted Ma Ames with plate in hand. "I think it's finally time for you to eat something."

Anxiety suddenly returned to crease Jed's brow.

Ma Ames cautioned while placing the plate before him. "Now, Honey," she said. "Don't get your hopes up too high on this first food. It might be a couple, three days even, before you can make some dregs."

Jed stared down at the plate to hide his embarrassment as he said, "Yes, ma'am."

**

 

Sherman was notorious for its friday night rowdiness. Booming business for a young doctor setting up practice in the wild, wild west. Two dollars to stitch up a cut, three dollars to set a broken bone, five dollars to remove a bullet… His prices were posted outside his office. Weekdays, he visited the neighboring towns or he went out on farm calls but friday nights, he made it a point to always be in Sherman.

Since the doctor was not due in until well after sundown, Joshua occupied his worried mind with his favorite past time. Poker. Finally up twenty dollars after losing nearly fifty, he took a break from the game to seek a little female companionship. Masturbating, he found, was no longer very productive. Not after his hearth incident with Ma Ames.

Flowing auburn hair and Nez Perce cheekbones, a pretty young philomel had been giving his money the eye all evening. Two dollars for an hour of her time, he thought, then he would check on the doctor's arrival. Gentlemanly, he removed his hat, lifted his chest and sashayed over to the bar to introduce himself. Placing his hat on the counter, he started to speak but something unusual snatched the words from his mouth. On the counter just next to his hat was another hat. Rattleskin.

Joshua cautiously turned for a glimpse at the man standing just next to him. It was a really big fellow. As if the fellow sensed the tension now emanating from Joshua, he turned his head to look at him. A dead white eye. Joshua didn't realize that he stared.

The big fellow often received gawks at his cataract eye. "You got a problem," he demanded.

Nez Perce cheekbones sensed his tension, too. She then saw his hand twitch by his holster on his hip between the two of them. Quickly and quietly she eased away.

Every muscle in Joshua's body strained to produce a smile. "No, no," he said. "Just admiring your hat. What is that? Snakeskin?"

"Rattle," the man gruffed out. With another glance at the conceding and cowardly smiler, he returned to his drink.

As calmly as his nerves would allow, Joshua put on his hat, tipped it at the young woman now watching from a safe distance and quietly left. Once outside, he exhaled. He then turned and looked over the swinging doors at the fellow's back. He thanked God that Jed wasn't there or the man would already be dead and Jed would be locked up for whatever time that remained in his life. After another look, Joshua left, striding toward the doctor's office while thinking.

**

By first appearance, Ma Ames was not at all impressed with the young doctor who had taken so much of her business. Somewhat reluctant, she let the small framed, bespectacled and awkward looking man into her home.

Dr Samuel Breedlove extended his hand after he entered. "I've glad to finally meet you," he said. I've heard so many wonderful things,"

Ma Ames interrupted him. "My patient is this way," she said. None to cordial, the ignored the lean fingers and led him to her second bedroom. "I'm sure Joshua filled you in on his trouble."

He stood a moment while gazing in fascination about her home. "Not much, I'm afraid," he spoke while he gazed. Mr Smith was in bit-of-a-hurry. He mentions some unusual burns which may require surgery and that you that you would explain everything to me, once I arrived."

Jed followed their conversation from the bedroom. "Josh didn't come back with you," he asked, alarmed.

As Dr Breedlove entered the bedroom door, the pale and sickly appearance that met him took him slightly aback. But a professional, he quickly corralled his emotions with words. "Your friend said that something came up and that he'll be along in a day or two," he spoke as he tilted Jed's head and examined his eyes. "He said, not to worry." Obvious to him, the young man was worried about a great deal. "I'd like to examine that burn, now," he asked.

**

Joshua Smith was winning at poker, as usual, but his mind was not on the card game or the five strangers seated around table. His thoughts were behind him. Discreetly, he listened in on the conversation at another table. The big fellow was in town recruiting new gang members. He said that cattle rustling was dangerous work and he needed strong, tough men, unafraid of the law. Joshua knew that the big fellow already considered him a coward, which precluded his audition. He would simply have to think of another way to get close enough to him to… his stomach soured each time he considered his intent.

But this big fellow was going to die. He had killed Jed. Had given him a long and slow death… had made his last struggling weeks to live a gut-wrenching hell, wasted to bone, only to lose his life in the end. His mind was made. This fellow was going to die. He only hoped to do it and not be apprehended by the law but even if he be hanged, he was going to kill this man.

**

Scar tissue. Five hours of delicate surgery, aided by Ma Ames and laudanum, Dr Breedlove was reasonably sure that he removed it all. So delicate and precise with his small slender fingers, Ma Ames marveled at his artistry. "You do fine work, Dr Breedlove," she said. She felt obligated to tell him that. In her old age, she was still learning a great deal.

"Thank you, ma'am," he said as he washed his hands after stitching Jed up. "But he's not out of the woods, yet. He'll require another long six weeks to heal and at least two of those bedridden to keep from bursting his stitches. And he's on a clear liquid diet, again. But I'm confident that you'll manage to prevent further infection and in four to six months, he should be completely back to normal." He felt obligated to say something to her, as well. "I must admit, ma'am. With burns of this magnitude and location, you've done a remarkable job to bring him this far."

She gazed down in sympathy at the young and tender face lying oblivious to the world. "And I'll keep him alive," she promised.


End file.
